It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism while the wolf remains of a different opinion. William Inge

That's the phrase that came to mind when reading Commander Salamander's report that the President has asked the Pentagon to come up with 10% cuts.

Jeez, one industry where products are American made and we want to contract it 10%?

The other thing that comes to mind is the promise to "go line by line" eliminating wasteful spending.... how's that going?

Are Terrorists Combatants or Criminals?

Over at Intel News, Ian Allen makes a good argument for not assassinating terrorists. The argument fails to convince though because it is based on the premise that that terrorists are mere criminals. While that is the traditional view, US policy after 9/11 is to treat terrorists as enemy combatants.

As Scott Reid pointed out in 2004
The recent activities of transnational1 terrorist organizations have transcended the realm of mere criminality. For more than a decade, the Al Qaeda terror network has repeatedly attacked U.S. citizens, property, and military interests, to wit: the World Trade Center in 1993, the U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, the U.S.S. Cole in a Yemeni port in 2000, and the World Trade Center and Pentagon on September 11, 2001. Al Qaeda has been characterized by one observer as a “modern army” with combat power, considerable financial resources, decentralized command and control, and operational reach into all the nations of the world. The President has responded to Al Qaeda’s asymmetric attacks with military force, which perversely elevates the status of these terrorists from criminals to enemies. When the Taliban government of Afghanistan persisted in providing Al Qaeda with a safe haven, it became our enemy as well.

Enemy combatants (whether lawful or unlawful) are subject to the international law of armed conflict, not criminal rules. That means they are fair game, anytime, anywhere, subject to the rules of war. Convince me that they are mere criminals, then I'll support an assassination ban and we can send in the FBI. Until then, they are targets.

Obama's View of the Economy


Instapundit linked to a story that Obama said in an interview, "Our challenge is going to be identifying what works and putting more money into that, eliminating things that don’t work, and making things that we have more efficient..."

That sounds to me exactly like what markets do.

Unfortunately, I don't think that is what the President Elect has in mind.

Obama's Wars

You write "US casualties are far fewer than in traffic accidents on American streets." That is not a new condition. US casualties have ALWAYS been far fewer than traffic accidents on American streets.



According to icasualties today, there were 4221 confirmed US deaths in Iraq since the beginning of the war in 2003. According to the US Dept of Transportation, US traffic fatalities were

2007 41,059//

2006 42,708//

2005 43,510

2004 42,836//

2003 42,884

The way I read that more Americans have died about every five weeks on the highways than have been lost in five years of war in Iraq.



Not a slam, but in a column as data heavy as that article, it could be misleading.
About Pakistan
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost